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Krak De Montreal
Montreal ( ar, مونتريال; la, Mons Regalis, Mont Real), or Qal'at ash-Shawbak (قلعة الشوبك) in Arabic, is a castle built by the Crusaders and expanded by the Mamluks, on the eastern side of the Arabah Valley, perched on the side of a rocky, conical mountain, looking out over fruit orchards below. The ruins are located next to the modern town of Shoubak in Jordan. Name The Crusaders, who wrote their chronicles in Medieval Latin, Old French and Occitan, mentioned the castle as Castrum Saboach or Scobach, or as Mons Regalis, Mont Real, and Monreal. The second set of variants translate to 'Royal Castle' or 'King's Castle'. The Arabic name is spelled variously as Shobak, Shawbak, Shaubak, Shubek, etc. The word castle or fortress translates in Arabic to ''qal'a''. Excavation history As of 1994, the castle had never yet been fully excavated, but as of 2006 it was being investigated by an Italian archaeological team from the University of Florence. History ...
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Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as ''Fort Ville-Marie, Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-peaked hill around which the early city of Ville-Marie is built. The city is centred on the Island of Montreal, which obtained its name from the same origin as the city, and a few much smaller peripheral islands, the largest of which is Île Bizard. The city is east of the national capital Ottawa, and southwest of the provincial capital, Quebec City. As of 2021, the city had a population of 1,762,949, and a Census Metropolitan Area#Census metropolitan areas, metropolitan population of 4,291,732, making it the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest city, and List of cen ...
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Kerak
Al-Karak ( ar, الكرك), is a city in Jordan known for its medieval castle, the Kerak Castle. The castle is one of the three largest castles in the region, the other two being in Syria. Al-Karak is the capital city of the Karak Governorate. Al-Karak lies to the south of Amman on the ancient King's Highway. It is situated on a hilltop about above sea level and is surrounded on three sides by a valley. Al-Karak has a view of the Dead Sea. A city of about 32,216 people (2005) has been built up around the castle and it has buildings from the 19th-century Ottoman period. The town is built on a triangular plateau, with the castle at its narrow southern tip. History Iron Age to Assyrian period Al-Karak has been inhabited since at least the Iron Age, and was an important city for the Moabites. In the Bible it is called ''Qer Harreseth'' or Kir of Moab, and is identified as having been subject to the Neo-Assyrian Empire; in the Books of Kings () and Book of Amos (), it is mentione ...
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Thietmar (pilgrim)
Thietmar or Dithmar was a German Christian pilgrim who visited the Holy Land in 1217–1218 and wrote an account of his travels, the . According to his own account, Thietmar and a group of pilgrims set out from Germany "signed with and protected by the cross".Denys Pringle, ''Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, 1187–1291'' (Ashgate, 2012), pp. 27–29. This would seem to indicate that he was a crusader, a conclusion accepted by Jaroslav Folda,Jaroslav Folda, ''Crusader Art in the Holy Land, From the Third Crusade to the Fall of Acre, 1187–1291'' (Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 121–124 and nn. but his account indicates that he was an unarmed pilgrim. From his work it can be seen that he was an educated man. He is sometimes called ''magister'' (teacher, German ), but the better manuscript tradition does not contain this word. He was probably a churchman from Westphalia and the leader of his group. He has been called a Franciscan friar, but the ''Chronicle'' of N ...
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Baibars
Al-Malik al-Zahir Rukn al-Din Baybars al-Bunduqdari ( ar, الملك الظاهر ركن الدين بيبرس البندقداري, ''al-Malik al-Ẓāhir Rukn al-Dīn Baybars al-Bunduqdārī'') (1223/1228 – 1 July 1277), of Turkic Kipchak origin, commonly known as Baibars or Baybars ( ar, بيبرس, ''Baybars'') – nicknamed Abu al-Futuh (; English: ''Father of Conquests'', referring to his victories) – was the fourth Mamluk sultan of Egypt and Syria in the Bahri dynasty, succeeding Qutuz. He was one of the commanders of the Egyptian forces that inflicted a defeat on the Seventh Crusade of King Louis IX of France. He also led the vanguard of the Egyptian army at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260, which marked the first substantial defeat of the Mongol army and is considered a turning point in history. The reign of Baybars marked the start of an age of Mamluk dominance in the Eastern Mediterranean and solidified the durability of their military system. He managed to pa ...
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Mamluk
Mamluk ( ar, مملوك, mamlūk (singular), , ''mamālīk'' (plural), translated as "one who is owned", meaning " slave", also transliterated as ''Mameluke'', ''mamluq'', ''mamluke'', ''mameluk'', ''mameluke'', ''mamaluke'', or ''marmeluke'') is a term most commonly referring to non-Arab, ethnically diverse (mostly Southern Russian, Turkic, Caucasian, Eastern and Southeastern European) slave-soldiers and freed slaves who were assigned military and administrative duties, serving the ruling Arab dynasties in the Muslim world. The most enduring Mamluk realm was the knightly military class in Egypt in the Middle Ages, which developed from the ranks of slave-soldiers. Originally the Mamluks were slaves of Turkic origin from the Eurasian Steppe, but the institution of military slavery spread to include Circassians, Abkhazians, Georgians,"Relations of the Georgian Mamluks of Egypt with Their Homeland in the Last Decades of the Eighteenth Century". Daniel Crecelius and Gotcha ...
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Kerak Castle
Kerak Castle ( ar, قلعة الكرك, Qal'at al-Karak) is a large medieval castle located in al-Karak, Jordan. It is one of the largest castles in the Levant. Construction began in the 1140s, under Pagan and Fulk, King of Jerusalem. The Crusaders called it ''Crac des Moabites'' or "Karak in Moab", as it is referred to in history books. It was also colloquially referred to as ''Krak of the Desert''. History Crusader period Pagan was also Lord of Oultrejordain and Kerak Castle became the centre of his power, replacing the weaker castle of Montreal to the south. Because of its position east of the Dead Sea, Kerak Castle was able to control bedouin herders as well as the trade routes from Damascus to Egypt and Mecca. His successors, his nephew Maurice and Philip of Milly, added towers and protected the north and south sides with two deep rock-cut ditches (the southern ditch also serving as a cistern). The most notable Crusader architectural feature surviving is the north wall, in ...
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Al-Adil I
Al-Adil I ( ar, العادل, in full al-Malik al-Adil Sayf ad-Din Abu-Bakr Ahmed ibn Najm ad-Din Ayyub, ar, الملك العادل سيف الدين أبو بكر بن أيوب,‎ "Ahmed, son of Najm ad-Din Ayyub, father of Bakr, the Just King, Sword of the Faith"; 1145 – 31 August 1218) was the fourth Sultan of Egypt and Syria, and brother of Saladin, who founded both the Sultanate of Egypt, and the Ayyubid dynasty. He was known to the Crusaders as Saphadin (derived from his ''laqab'' or honorific title Sayf ad-Din, meaning "Sword of Faith"), a name by which he is still known in the Western world. A gifted and effective administrator and organizer, Al-Adil provided crucial military and civilian support for the great campaigns of Saladin (an early example of a great minister of war). He was also a capable general and strategist in his own right, and was instrumental in the transformation of the decayed Fatimid Caliphate of Cairo into the Ayyubid Sultanate of Egypt. Fa ...
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Siege Engine
A siege engine is a device that is designed to break or circumvent heavy castle doors, thick city walls and other fortifications in siege warfare. Some are immobile, constructed in place to attack enemy fortifications from a distance, while others have wheels to enable advancing up to the enemy fortification. There are many distinct types, such as siege towers that allow foot soldiers to scale walls and attack the defenders, battering rams that damage walls or gates, and large ranged weapons (such as ballistae, catapults/trebuchets and other similar constructions) that attack from a distance by launching projectiles. Some complex siege engines were combinations of these types. Siege engines are fairly large constructions – from the size of a small house to a large building. From antiquity up to the development of gunpowder, they were made largely of wood, using rope or leather to help bind them, possibly with a few pieces of metal at key stress points. They could launch simple ...
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Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. is a city in Western Asia. Situated on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, it is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world and is considered to be a holy city for the three major Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Both Israelis and Palestinians claim Jerusalem as their Capital city, capital, as Israel maintains its primary governmental institutions there and the State of Palestine ultimately foresees it as its seat of power. Because of this dispute, Status of Jerusalem, neither claim is widely recognized internationally. Throughout History of Jerusalem, its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed at least twice, Sie ...
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Saladin
Yusuf ibn Ayyub ibn Shadi () ( – 4 March 1193), commonly known by the epithet Saladin,, ; ku, سه‌لاحه‌دین, ; was the founder of the Ayyubid dynasty. Hailing from an ethnic Kurdish family, he was the first of both Egypt and Syria. An important figure of the Third Crusade, he spearheaded the Muslim military effort against the Crusader states in the Levant. At the height of his power, Ayyubid territorial control spanned Egypt, Syria, Upper Mesopotamia, the Hejaz, Yemen, the Maghreb, and Nubia. Alongside his uncle Shirkuh, a military general of the Zengid dynasty, Saladin was sent to Egypt under the Fatimid Caliphate in 1164, on the orders of Nur ad-Din. With their original purpose being to help restore Shawar as the to the teenage Fatimid caliph al-Adid, a power struggle ensued between Shirkuh and Shawar after the latter was reinstated. Saladin, meanwhile, climbed the ranks of the Fatimid government by virtue of his military successes against Crusader assault ...
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Ayyubid Dynasty
The Ayyubid dynasty ( ar, الأيوبيون '; ) was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultan of Egypt, Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171, following his abolition of the Fatimid Caliphate, Fatimid Caliphate of Egypt. A Sunni Muslim of Kurds, Kurdish origin, Saladin had originally served Nur ad-Din (died 1174), Nur ad-Din of Syria, leading Nur ad-Din's army in battle against the Crusaders in Fatimid Egypt, where he was made Vizier. Following Nur ad-Din's death, Saladin was proclaimed as the first Sultan of Egypt, and rapidly expanded the new sultanate beyond the frontiers of Egypt to encompass most of the Levant (including the former territories of Nur ad-Din), in addition to Hijaz, Yemen, northern Nubia, Tripolitania, Tarabulus, Cyrenaica, southern Anatolia, and northern Iraq, the homeland of his Kurdish family. By virtue of his sultanate including Hijaz, the location of the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina, he was the first ruler to be hailed as the Cus ...
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Mecca
Mecca (; officially Makkah al-Mukarramah, commonly shortened to Makkah ()) is a city and administrative center of the Mecca Province of Saudi Arabia, and the Holiest sites in Islam, holiest city in Islam. It is inland from Jeddah on the Red Sea, in a narrow valley above sea level. Its last recorded population was 1,578,722 in 2015. Its estimated metro population in 2020 is 2.042million, making it the List of cities in Saudi Arabia by population, third-most populated city in Saudi Arabia after Riyadh and Jeddah. Pilgrims more than triple this number every year during the Pilgrimage#Islam, pilgrimage, observed in the twelfth Islamic calendar, Hijri month of . Mecca is generally considered "the fountainhead and cradle of Islam". Mecca is revered in Islam as the birthplace of the Prophets and messengers in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad. The Hira cave atop the ("Mountain of Light"), just outside the city, is where Muslims believe the Quran was first revealed to Muhammad. Vis ...
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